


Flutter

by Polly_Lynn



Category: Castle
Genre: Domestic Fluff, F/M, Family, Family Feels, Family Fluff, Married Couple, Married Sex, Pregnancy, Romance, Tooth-Rotting Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-20
Updated: 2015-06-20
Packaged: 2018-04-05 08:30:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,312
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4172988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Polly_Lynn/pseuds/Polly_Lynn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"He thinks he's sneaky. In general, he labors under that delusion, and now—now—he's sure that he playing it 100% cool. The reality, of course, is that he's the opposite of sneaky. The opposite of cool. And he's an utter disaster at keeping secrets, especially now."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Flutter

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: One-shot. Future fic. Brain's idea entirely. My fingers write under protest.

 

 

He thinks he's sneaky. In general, he labors under that delusion, and now— _now—_ he's sure that he playing it 100% cool. The reality, of course, is that he's the opposite of sneaky. The opposite of cool. And he's an utter disaster at keeping secrets, _especially_ now.

Which is why she dragged him to the Hamptons for a few days. Because they have a secret. And a secret-related deal. And he's breaking the rules. He's trying to, anyway.

"I will burn it, Castle." Her voice drifts up from the depths of the couch.

He jumps. Easily a foot, and his high-pitched squeak splits the dimly lit air.

"Kate! Jesu . . . _Geez!"_

She stifles a laugh at the way he catches himself, reverting to a G-rated exclamation. She tries to pull the appropriate scowl together by the time he snaps on the lamp by her feet, fussing with the shade to soften the light as much as he can. She overshoots. She must, because he's sinking on to the narrow edge of the cushion beside her. Looming.

"Are you ok?" He sweeps her hair back from her forehead, pressing his palm to her skin, sticky with sleep in the closed-up room.

"I'm _fine_." She bats at him, struggling to sit up. He fusses, pulling one pillow from under his own thigh and shoving another behind her back. "I said I'm _fine_ , Castle."

"Other than being asleep at three in the afternoon." He scoots out of ear-twisting range and sticks his tongue out at her.

"It is _not_. . ." She grabs his wrist, torquing it to look at his watch. Comparing it to her own and falling back hard into New Fort Pillow with a groan. "How can it be three o'clock?"

"Depends on who you ask," he says, cheerfully arranging her on the couch to make more room for himself. "You've got your basic Deity—or Culture Hero sometimes—Pulls The Sun Across the Sky myths, you've got Daily Death and Rebirth, your boring 'Earth rotating on its axis'. . . "

He makes air quotes. It leaves his midsection vulnerable. She lashes out with one foot, but he catches it. She's slow. Still groggy even though she's just slept for a million hours in a row. It's humiliating, but he's running his fingers around her ankle and up her calves, kneading the muscle and soothing. Humiliating is kind of hard to care about.

"I came in for a book." She studies the ceiling, like some sequence of events that makes sense might be revealed if she looks hard enough. "That was after lunch."

"Which you ate at ten thirty."

He leaps on board, just like they're spinning a theory. He looks _delighted,_ and she'd kind of like to kill him. Except he'd made her a giant lunch when they'd hardly finished doing the dishes from breakfast. And then he'd run from the hill to the house and back again at least fifteen times because she kept _wanting_ things, and he really is the sweetest man, and she might _cry_.

"I am . . . " She wraps her arms around her head and wails. "God, Castle, I am a walking _stereotype!_ "

"Technically, you're a lounging stereotype at the moment."

He curls his fingers around her calves, preemptively pinning them and completely failing to see the pillow coming when she launches it at his head. He bats it away, laughing. Loosens his fingers and holds her captive still, gliding his thumb firmly along the arch of her foot. Gently rotating one ankle then the other to ease the stiffness of whatever weird position she'd dropped off in.

"I hate you," she murmurs, completely without conviction as she shimmies her hips down to rest more of herself half across his lap.

"I can take it, Beckett." He squares his shoulders and puffs out his chest. "I'm prepared for you to hate me—a little or a lot—for the foreseeable future."

His eyes roam over her, head to toe, as he says it, though. He grins, pleased and proprietary, and she should _extra_ hate him for that, but she doesn't. She hauls herself up, the opposite of groggy now. Energized. _Starving_.

"I want you." It hardly needs saying. She's straddling his lap, her hips rising and falling as she tears violently at his buttons. At his belt. Her mouth lands where it will, and she bites down hard on his skin, because with all this flurry of effort he should be significantly more naked by now. " _Want_ you, Castle. Want you. Want you."

She chants in his ear, writhing. Surrendering to the fact that his hands work better than hers at the moment. That he's more coordinated and efficient, even though that's totally _wrong_. But he has her pants off. More importantly, he very nearly has _his_ pants off and she's not inclined to argue with results.

"I am . . ." He gasps as her hands dart high and low. Sliding and tugging at his body. At her own. ". . . also prepared for your moods to be somewhat . . . _Beckett_ . . . " He raps out the name and tugs at her hair hard enough to still her while he kicks clear of his jeans. "Somewhat," he says again, drawing it out, "mercurial."

_Mercurial,_ she thinks. She could kill him for that. For his four-dollar words when she's out of her mind. She could kill him, but just then, he curves an arm around her waist and flips their bodies. He lays her out beneath him, and she thinks it can wait a while.

Killing him can definitely wait.

 

* * *

 

Someone is snoring. Someone is drooling. She cracks one eye open and he's a nose-to-nose blur. Vibrating with happiness and definitely awake. It has . . . implications. She tries to flop on to her back, grimacing at the wet smear under her cheek.

"You're hungry," he says quietly as he nudges at her hip and helps her complete the circuit. He sits up and starts rooting around for pants and shirt and the rest.

"Not hungry." She swipes at her crusty eyes, insistent at exactly the same moment her stomach lets out an absolutely cavernous rumble.

"Well. _Someone_ is hungry after all that . . ." His face creases in confusion. He gives her a testy look. "After all _that_." He stands, disappointingly half dressed already, and gestures down at her. At the flashes of bare skin peeking out from beneath the undulating tangle of blanket.

"All that sex?"

She arches her back and throws her arms overhead. The blanket shifts, and he's all red-faced consternation, caught between scolding and jumping her. Again. She blinks wide, innocent eyes up at him, enjoying the way his gaze tracks the slightest movements of her body. The way he drifts closer, abandoning the buttons on his shirt.

Her stomach chooses that moment to roar again. She claps both hands over it, her eyes flying wide. He laughs and stoops to kiss her, dumping the pile of her clothes on top of her.

"Yes. All the _s-e-x_ that has clearly depleted your resources and left you vulnerable to the little monster."

He splays his fingertips over her middle, a fond, awed gesture that makes her want to roll her eyes. Except it also makes her tear up. And want to climb him like a tree. Because she's a . . . semi-upright stereotype.

"The little monster doesn't have ears," she yells after him, venting a little of her squirming frustration, as she pulls her arms through bra straps and shirt sleeves. Feeling abruptly, profoundly guilty as she wriggles back into her pants and catches a glimpse of her own abdomen. "Well, you don't." She pokes at the skin just below her belly button, then presses a protective hand over the same spot. "You're a long way from ears yet."

 

* * *

 

There's an enormous spread already in progress when she makes her way into the kitchen. Spiced nuts and three or four different kinds of bread piled on a board with dried fruit. Skewers with peppers and squash, bright from the grill, and beef cubes with absolutely no pink at all. Crudité with crocks of peanut butter and hummus and something green and mushy that makes her queasy just to look at. He turns as she's pushing it as far from her as it will go.

"Ok. That's a no to guacamole." He rescues the dish just as it's about to tip over the edge of the counter.

"That can't be guacamole." She holds her hand out for it, demanding. Recoiling the second it comes near enough for her to catch a whiff. She looks at him miserably as he sets on the counter, far behind him. "I _love_ guacamole."

"You do," he says matter of factly. "Just not at this exact moment. Give it an hour. Or a day."

"You think I'm crazy." She shoves a cucumber in her mouth, mumbling around it as she slathers peanut butter on celery and makes a grab for cauliflower like he might get there first.

He sets down the plate in his hand hastily enough that it clatters a while before it settles. He moves swiftly to her side of the counter and wraps his arms around her from behind.

"I don't think you're crazy." He lifts the hair from her neck and presses kisses to her spine. "I think you're amazing." He opens his mouth, tasting her skin. "And even more ridiculously hot than usual." He reaches out with one hand and pulls her piled-high plate closer. "And I think you'd better eat while you have the chance."

She laughs and pushes him away. Taps the stool next to her with her toes and hooks the rungs to pull it nearer hers before he sits down. She eats mechanically at first. Bite after bite. Strange flavors mixing in her mouth. It's an odd sensation. Like she's filling a cavern. Watching from the outside, almost, and her mind clears as she does. She feels awake. Alive and _invincible._ And still bottomlessly hungry.

"It's weird."

She looks up at him, and it's like another spin on the carousel. Like they're sharing the edge of her desk, spitballing over a POI on a case. He nods, eager for her take, and it's exactly like that.

"This isn't supposed to be happening yet." She gestures to the food. To the massive pile of remnants on her plate. "Not all at once."

She slides a hand up his thigh and his eyes darken. It's just a demonstration, though. For now it is, and he's disappointed when she pulls away and goes back to munching on crusty bread slathered with an unspeakable combination of things.

"There's not really any 'supposed to be,' right? Different for everyone." He gives her a sidelong glance. Hesitating, then boldly snagging a piece of meat from her plate. That's a demonstration, too. "And it's on your mind. All the stuff we've been reading. All the stuff from the doctor . . ." He trails off, suddenly registering the glare she's pinning him with. "What?"

"If you're about to use the _P_ word, Castle . . ."

He frowns at her. Lowers his voice to a pointless whisper as he holds a hand over her middle. "Pregnant?"

"Psychosomatic." She swipes at his ear, laughing hard enough that he has to grab her hips to keep her from toppling off the stool. "You're an idiot," she says, kissing him sloppily as she abandons her own seat and climbs half into his lap.

"Silent _P_ ," he protests, winding an arm around her waist to keep her from sliding off again. "That was a trick question." He feeds them both, popping cherry tomatoes and bites of bell pepper into her mouth, then his, while she loads up another slice of bread. "I just mean that you're hyperaware of everything. Ever since . . ."

He trails off, kissing her with a dark groan that's wanting and amazed and goofily fond. A groan that's as messy end everything-at-once as she feels.

She's embarrassed most of the time. The memory makes her cheeks burn, because it's utterly not her and she writhes a little to think how it'll follow her. But he loves it. He can't wait to tell the story, and right now—in this particular moment—she's with him.

"Ever since that flutter," she finishes, kissing him back. Kissing him hard.

 

* * *

 

"Are you _supposed_ to have superpowers?" He pants, finally reaching the crest of the dune she's been looking down on him from for a good two minutes. "I do _not_ remember anything about superpowers in the books."

"They come and go." She holds her hand out to him, hauling him up the last few feet. "You might have to carry me home."

He looks back at the miles of beach between them and the house, grim but game. "If you're up for piggy back, I can do that."

She snorts and pushes at his hip, spinning him to unbuckle the rolled blanket strapped to the soft side of the cooler bag he'd insisted on bringing. She shakes it out with an expert flick, loving the blood red light filtering through as it catches air. He's already setting up yet _another_ spread by the time she's done pinning down the corners with rocks and settling herself.

"What?" He says it without turning. Apparently her glare is working well enough for him to feel it between his shoulder blades. " _I'm_ hungry. Not everything is about you, Beckett." He makes a quick move, ducking his head and jerking the hem of her shirt upward. "Or you, little monster." He drops a kiss left of her belly button.

It's against the rules. All of it's _strictly_ against the rules, but she's laughing too hard to care. She's starving and sprawling with her head in his lap, folding their hands and pressing them against the giddy feeling inside.

He feeds her and she feeds him. They talk and don't talk. They wait for the sunset, and they both love how long it is in coming.

"This was a good idea," he says quietly as the last, stubborn streaks fade in the West. "Coming out here alone and . . ."

"Getting all _this_ out of your system?" She tips her head back on his thigh and grins up at him.

"Delusions. I don't remember that in the books, either." He smacks a kiss on her forehead. "None of this is _ever_ gonna be out of my system. But it's good to have a few days to . . ." He looks down at her, breathless and happy. ". . . Settle into this."

"Settle," she echoes. She feels anything _but_ settled, and still the word feels right. "We can tell them." The words bubble up out of her. Unexpected, but they're right, too. All the world feels right. "Your mom. Alexis. My dad." Her fingers tighten around his. "I think we can tell them . . ."

"We said we'd wait." She feels what it costs him. The strain tightening his arms and legs and everything. He wants to tell so badly. But they have a secret-related deal and he knows she's worried. That two stupid words— _elderly primigravida—_ have her worried, even though she hasn't had so much as a twinge of anything scary. "You know everyone will know as soon as _anyone_ knows."

She nods. It's true. Alexis is a hopeless liar and Martha is all body language and effusiveness. Everyone will know, and it's safer to wait. Just a few more weeks when everything's a lot more certain. But she feels certain now. She feels bold. Superpowered.

"Everyone will know." She wraps her arms around herself, trapping his palm tight. "That sounds good."

"It does?" He bends to peer at her face, excited and afraid of it. "You're not messing with me?"

"I wouldn't go that far. Always messing with you." She stretches up to kiss him. "But everyone knowing. That sounds good."

"Game changer," he says, not quite to himself. He shifts on to one hip, sending her head lolling as he leans to the far end of the blanket.

She's up like a shot, falling on his back as he digs for something.

"No!" She swats at him over his shoulder. " _Not_ a game changer. Rules still in effect. No presents!"

But he's ignoring her. Pulling a soft, flat oblong, all wrapped up with a with a bow, from the outside pocket of the cooler.

"I'll burn it," she says lamely, curiosity and fondness and stupid hormones winning out over the line in the sand she ought to be drawing. 

"Your prerogative." He shrugs, eyes dancing as he nudges it toward her again. "For you, not little monster."

"For me?" She snatches it from him. She wasn't expecting that. Not when he tried to sneak it into the study. Not at all. She squashes the corners between her palms. Fabric, neatly folded into a square. She feels the curve of a neckline. A shirt, most likely. "It's not . . ." She narrows here eyes. "Castle, if this is _maternity_ clothes . . ."

"No. _No!"_ He looks at her—at her absolutely flat stomach—like she's crazy. "Although . . . "

His gaze lingers on her chest. He insists they're bigger and though she'd die before admitting it, her sports bras are feeling a little snug. She kicks out at him, pulling at the ribbon as he laughs and fends her off.

"It just . . ." His voice drops as she peels the paper away, his face serious and shy. "I saw it in one of the stalls while I was out laying in supplies. It reminded me."

She holds it up, turning toward what little light there is filtering through the grass from the boardwalk high above and behind them. She hardly needs to. The design has a light all its own. The cool, eerie blue of butterflies. Dozens of them hovering beneath the delicate outline of a ribcage. She holds it up to herself.

"Flutter," she says. She looks up. Finds her own wide smile mirrored in his. "Just like this, Castle." Her voice is thick, but she says it again. "It's just like this."

 

* * *

 

_It's pitch black. One of those almost-summer hours in the dead of night that slips by so quickly. Light just a little while ago and light coming soon, but for now it's pitch black._

_She's on her back, absolutely still. Well clear of him, though she hates that space. The chasm of cooling sheets, but the mattress rises and falls with his breath and she needs to be sure._

_It comes again. Just when her mind has made it to the far edges of this foolishness. Just when she knows it's absolute nonsense, it comes again. Movement that ripples against palm and fingers pressed hard to her body._

_It's twice at least. Three times if it's really what woke her. (It is. She knows it is, just like she_ knows _it's not nonsense.) She keeps her peace, though._

_She stays just like that, waiting again. Telling herself she's imagining it. That it's something else, if it's anything at all, and it probably isn't._

_But it comes again, just then. So much sooner and long before logic has a chance to move in and do some clean up. It comes, stronger this time, and she laughs out loud. She rolls toward him, clawing at his fingers, shaking him._

_"Castle." A hissed whisper at first. Almost a shout by the time his eyes even flutter. "Castle!"_

_"Beckett." He reaches for her. Rough, terrified hands and his eyes flying wide. "Kate. What . . ."_

_"I'm pregnant." She blurts it. Blushes hard. Furiously, but she says it again. "I'm pregnant."_

_"How . . . how do you know?" He stammers, but it's emotion, not doubt. It's joy and unquestioning belief._

_"A flutter."_

_She grabs his fingers, buoyed by it. His joy and unquestioning belief. She presses his hand to her body, her own holding it fast, and there it is again._

_"Whoa!" He breathes out a laugh, his eyes going wider still. "Flutter."_

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: I have an affinity for celestial events for no particular reason, and for someone who hates the sun, I write a lot about it. So this is kind of a solstice story, but mostly it was inspired by a design called "Lantern" over at Threadless.com (https://www.threadless.com/@Thunderlord). So blame the sun, blame the artist, blame Brain, but don't blame me for this. Oy.


End file.
